The past ecology of Abies alba provides new perspectives on future responses of silver fir forests to global warming

Paleoecology can provide valuable insights into the ecology of species that complement observation and experiment-based assessments of climate-impact dynamics. New paleoecological records (e.g. pollen, macrofossils) from the Italian Peninsula suggest a much wider climatic niche of the important European tree species Abies alba (silver fir) than observed in its present spatial range. To explore this discrepancy between current and past distribution we analyse climatic data (e.g. temperature, precipitation, frost, humidity, sunshine) and vegetation-independent paleoclimatic reconstructions (e.g. lake levels, chironomids) and use global coupled carbon-cycle climate (NCAR CSM1.4) and dynamic vegetation (LANDCLIM) modelling. The combined evidence suggests that during the mid-Holocene (ca. 6000 years ago), prior to humanization of vegetation, A. alba formed forests under conditions that exceeded modern (1961-1990) upper temperature limit of the species by ca. 5-7 {degree sign}C (July means). ...